


All My Answered Prayers

by what_alchemy



Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Religious Conflict, Trapped, World War II
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-01
Updated: 2018-06-01
Packaged: 2019-05-16 16:54:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,091
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14815223
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/what_alchemy/pseuds/what_alchemy
Summary: Spare him and I’ll be good, Lord, spare him and I’ll never whisper a word of what I’m feeling or all my sinful thoughts, Lord, spare him and I’ll never ask you for anything again, O Lord.





	All My Answered Prayers

**Author's Note:**

  * For [abijah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/abijah/gifts).



> For Abijahm, who asked for Howling Commanders-era trapped Steve/Bucky. Hope you like it! I had a blast writing it <3

No light, no breath. Bucky coughs out dust and heaves half as much in again — something’s sitting on his chest, his legs, something big. An elephant, he and Steve saw a picture of one in Central Library just last week; it must be that elephant big and grey, dust on its skin, dust flapping around those ears and boy was going to see Dumbo later that day a mistake, two grown men sitting side by side pretending not to cry when the little guy’s mom is locked away—

“Buck?” Steve’s coughing and Bucky tries to get up, tries to act because that’s his job: take care of Steve who is coughing, coughing, always coughing _Jesus, Mary and Joseph he’ll lose a lung better not get too attached_ and Bucky’s just trying to— “Buck! Are you there?”

“’m here!” he croaks, and then has a coughing fit. “I’m here! Steve!”

Bucky blinks and blinks and he’s seeing stars but there’s nothing and he would have thought nothing would be blacker than this but it’s purple, so dark a purple and all the stars are cascading down and Bucky coughs again, gasps again, vision clearing to all that purple nothing.

“Bucky!”

‘“I’m pinned!” he calls out. “Where are you?”

A scuffle and some grunting and then a great crash, the ground shaking with it.

“I’m here,” Steve says, panting. “I’m coming.”

“You pinned too?”

“I was,” Steve says. “But.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Bucky says, “all them fancy new muscles a’yours.”

“Keep it up, pal, and I won’t even dig you out.”

“Still a punk.”

A hand lands on Bucky’s shin and all Bucky can hear is the noisy sigh of Steve’s relief. The hand gropes upward and hits what’s left of the concrete beam that landed on him.

“Bomb?” Bucky says.

“Shh,” Steve says, “save your breath.”

“That’s my line,” Bucky says. “I’m fine. Where are the guys?”

“You don’t remember?”

Bucky remembers so much he wishes he could forget. The blood and shit and death of the prison camp. The screams of the other soldiers, the screams shredding his own throat. The whites of his friends’ eyes. The bite of the straps on his flesh. The smell, hot and acrid burning off the hairs in his nose. The light blinding him. The German, scraping his eardrums like a dull knife. The needles, the cold and the heat blasting through his veins. The pounding in his head. The liquid of his guts. The unanswered prayers. 32557038. 32557038. 32557038.

“Buck. Bucky.” The best voice. _His_ voice. “You’re here with me. We’re in France. It’s May 6th, 1944. We’ve been bombed out but we’re all right now and the bombs have stopped. You’re here with me.”

A hand on his forehead, a thumb stroking his hairline.

“Steve,” Bucky gasps. 

“I’m here.”

“Where are the guys?” he asks.

“We left them back at camp,” Steve says. “We were going to scout ahead, remember? If we can’t get out of here on our own, they’ll be by soon enough to help.”

“Oh.”

Steve stands with a grunt.

“Where you hurt?” Bucky asks. 

“I’m fine.”

“Where you hurt, Steve?”

“It’s nothing.”

“I swear to God—”

“Let me get this rubble off you before you box my ears, yeah?”

“You’re gonna hurt yourself worse if you—”

Another grunt and crash and suddenly Bucky can breathe right again. He heaves in air and catches nothing but dust he has to cough out again, but he sits up and Steve is there, sitting beside him, rubbing his back and murmuring the soothing nonsense he must have heard out of Bucky’s own mouth a thousand times over a thousand sleepless nights. It’s as if they stepped into a funhouse mirror that peers into the past, all jumbled up. But hang the funhouse, hang the serum and the Vita-Rays and Dr. Erskine and the world falling down around their ears: Bucky has one job, has only ever had one job.

“Tell me where you’re hurt, Steve.”

Steve sighs. “It’ll heal itself in a few hours.”

“That’s not what I’m asking for and you know it.”

“You were the one under five hundred pounds of concrete just now. We should make sure you’re not bleeding internally.”

“Steve. No static now.”

Another sigh and Bucky hears a zipper. Fingers grope for his in the dark. Steve pulls Bucky’s hand to his side where Bucky can feel a wet, ragged wound winding its way up Steve’s ribs. It’s hot, and Bucky barely touches it, but he yanks his hand away for fear of hurting him. He grazes the panel of muscle now decorating Steve’s stomach and shudders.

“Just a scratch,” Steve says. The zipper goes up again.

“Buddy, if that’s a scratch, then I’m Cary Grant.”

Steve chuckles. “You wish, jerk.”

“You got any water?”

Steve rummages around until he presses a canteen into Bucky’s hands. Bucky unscrews the top and drinks deep. It’s warm and it tastes off and it’s damn near perfect. He feels it soaking into his cells, lighting up all his systems. Suddenly Bucky believes he could run from here to Germany and back without breaking a sweat. Punch Hitler in the nose a time or two while he’s at it.

“Easy,” Steve says. “We still gotta make sure you’re all right.”

“I am,” Bucky says. “Never been better.”

“Don’t snow me, Buck.”

“You know what they say about pots and kettles,” Bucky says. He pushes the canteen back at Steve.

“Bucky.”

“Look, I’m fine, all right? I can’t expain it, but I’m not one to go looking gift horses in the mouth.”

“Fine. But the moment you feel like you’re fading, we get you to a medic, got it?”

“Aye aye, Captain.” Bucky snaps off a non-regulation salute and Steve snorts.

“We gotta work on getting outta here, then,” he says. “The air’s not getting stale so there must be a source somewhere, but I’m not seeing any light, are you?”

Bucky squints around. Uncle Sam didn’t make him a sniper for nothing.

“There,” he says, grabbing Steve’s arm. They make their way gingerly over dust and debris to a narrow opening in the space they occupy. It’s too small for Steve, but Bucky wedges himself inside. He sees a fissure in the debris well above his head. He pulls back to let Steve know.

“Do we pry ourselves out at the crack and risk the rest of this building coming down on our heads or is there a better way?” Steve says. This close to where the light trickles in, Bucky can see Steve like a shadow, nothing but a shape in the darkness. It calms him though — there’s the cut of Steve’s chin, there’s the broken line of Steve’s nose, there’s the way his hair flops over his forehead. It’s all there. Through everything. They’re both all there.

“We’d have to stack a bunch of this shit up,” Bucky says, “and then I’d have to balance on it all while reaching to poke the hole, but even if I manage to make any headway like that, the building’s gonna come down.” Bucky shakes his head. “We wouldn’t make it. Our best bet is to find the weakest point in the walls, determine what’s holding everything else up, and calculate if we can run like hell before we’re crushed again. Or…”

“Or?”

Bucky pulls himself out of the corner and looks Steve in the face. His eyes are shadowed.

“Or we wait for the guys and when they come to check this place out, we shout for ’em and they determine the best course of action from outside, where they can see everything.”

Steve casts about as if searching for another point of entry, but Bucky knows by the slope of his shoulders there won’t be an argument. That scratch of his must be throbbing, and he’ll be worrying about Bucky like any self-respecting mother hen. He hands Bucky the canteen again and their fingers brush. Steve snatches his hand back and stumbles over the rubble. Bucky catches him, those two big biceps of his fitting just right in Bucky’s palms, like nature and Howard Stark made them just for him.

“Whoa there, big fella,” Bucky says. “You’d think I had a case of cooties the way you turned tail there.”

“Sorry,” Steve says. He steps back and gropes along what passes for a wall. “C’mon, let’s find you a seat.”

“I told you, I’m fine.”

“You still need rest,” Steve says, inching farther away. “We both do.”

“What gives, Rogers?” Bucky says. “One second you’re feeling me for a fever like someone’s fussy mom and the next you can’t get away from me quick enough.”

“It’s nothing.”

“Ah, Christ, Steve, if you got a problem just have out with it. I don’t have the nerves for this guessing game shit.”

“Look, I know you don’t like the way I look now, all right? It’s too—I’m trying not to bother you with…all this.” A shrug, like he’s small again, like he’s Bucky’s best guy and he never left Brooklyn and he’s safe and sound back in their crackerjack apartment except for the fights and the coughing and the heart murmur and the scoliosis and the poor circulation and the one deaf ear and all the praying Bucky did day in and day out to just _spare him and I’ll be good, Lord, spare him and I’ll never whisper a word of what I’m feeling or all my sinful thoughts, Lord, spare him and I’ll never ask you for anything again, O Lord._

_“What?”_

“You don’t have to pretend,” Steve says. “I’ve seen the way you look at me since I sprung you from that camp. I know it’s…grotesque. So.”

“So? _So?_ So nothin’!” Bucky threw his hands up. “I don’t give a hoot what you look like! Where you got such an idea I don’t even know but you got the wrong end of the damn stick, pal!”

“Well I sure as shit didn’t pluck it outta thin air!”

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“”When you think I’m not looking, you look at me like I’m a circus freak! Like you can’t stand the sight of me but you’re gonna stare anyway, like you’re mad at me when all I ever wanted was to help and when I finally found a way it made you hate me!”

“Fine, you know what, I _am_ mad at you!” Bucky pokes a finger into Steve’s chest. “Madder’n hell that you went and signed up for some quack to experiment on your body first moment my back was turned! Anything could have happened, Steve! You could be dead in some goddamn science experiment gone wrong and I’d never fucking know! How could you do that to me, Steve, huh? How could you even think to leave me like that?”

“I’m glad I did it,” Steve snaps, catching Bucky’s wrist. “I’m glad I took my only chance, I’m glad I got you off that table, and I’m glad I can finally do my part with my best guy by my side and I’m not sorry, Buck. I’m not fucking sorry.”

They were both breathing hard, the air between them humid and recycled. 

“I don’t hate your new body,” Bucky says, voice low. He hears Steve swallow. “I’m glad you got me off that table too. There’s no one— no one I’d rather be here with.” His heart’s about to beat out of his chest but Bucky takes the only proper chance he’ll ever get and pulls out of Steve’s grip only to tangle their fingers together. Steve inhales sharply and squeezes back.

“You’re a jerk,” Steve whispers.

“You interested in kissing jerks?”

“ _God_ ,” Steve says, and Bucky doesn’t know if he’s taking the Lord’s name in vain or praying. “God, I tried so hard not to be this way, but yes, yes.”

Bucky had always imagined this moment as one in which he had to lean down, but now he tips his face up and presses his lips to Steve’s. Their stubble is like electricity between them and both their mouths taste like sour dust but the touch of their tongues fires up his whole body. Yes yes yes it’s perfect, everything he ever wanted, and he’s got a new prayer even if God’s not listening, even if there is no God to listen to sinners like him: _Please Lord, let him come out of this alive. Please Lord, keep him safe. Please Lord, let us have this one thing._

 

**End**


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